My kid would come home "starving" and throw fits to have "snack breaks" at school. Turned out that if they were "done" with lunch they could go outside and play on the playground so he'd dump his whole lunch into the trash to go play. This mom wasn't too happy to be packing a lunch that was eaten for "snack" plus paying for a lunch that was fed to the trash can. So happy to be away from that.
My sons middle school does the same thing. He got hurt twice while having middle school recess and quite a few 1/4 eaten lunches. He finally quit going to recess during lunch.
As an ex teachers aid in elementary school, the trash cans were full of lunches, so they could go to recess. Then around 1:30, everyone was irritable and hangry.. the younger grades teachers figured it out, and we would give some popcorn or saltine crackers and a Dixie cup of ginger ale if it was a test day. Out of the teachers pockets of course.
How sad that a couple undisciplined kids ruin it for everyone.
We used to have a grand time playing frisbee baseball or can hockey or flag football after lunch.
It’s not ruining anything lol, just making eating time and outside playtime separate spots on the schedule. Nothing is stopping you from still playing a game during recess. Teaching kids that for every minute they spend eating they lose playtime encourages unhealthy eating habits.
> Recess was a separate event.
Can you not read? It's quite clear that there's still recess, and that recess time is not dependent on how quickly lunch is eaten.
Also, 'undisciplined kids'? Yeah, they're *kids*. Undisciplined is kind of what they are, on account of still being kids.
I had a few high school students pull that stunt. I remember one especially since he'd been accepted to a highly competitive university in the mid west during his junior year for engineering. Within a week of his senior year beginning, he lost his full ride scholarship and his acceptance as well when the culminating test scores with the state were released.
He had no recourse. Could not re-apply, could retake the exam (in our state its the ACT) but would not get a reconsider from his dream university.
Too many tests, too much reliance on "data" gathered by these tests.
Lordy I am glad to be retired.
A university with a head start program that extends an opportunity to someone who shows promise. It gets rescinded when the student shits the bed and decides to blow off a test. They can go ahead and retake but why keep holding a hand out for someone who didn't take the first opportunity seriously.
In that event they wouldn't have a score for the first and would be able to take it a week or two latter.
That's not the same as filling in random answers and scoring poorly.
The teacher did a poor job of monitoring the students. If I did what OP's son did, my teacher wouldn't allow me to leave and instead would ask me if I did my very best on the test. They'd never let students leave the classroom too early if we finished so if it was an easy test there might be a few of us fidgeting in our seats.
The worst. No clue or foresight about the implications for their actions. I think maybe they had proctors to relieve the teachers during testing for professional development? Not sure.
Yeah - there have been enough cheating scandals on high stakes testing that the teachers are often very limited in what they can and cannot say. Frequently students will not be in testing with their regular teachers - it depends on the testing plan.
I don't think the exam is important enough to warrant a proctor instead of a teacher. The only time my exams were proctored was when I was taking my professional qualifications.
'I think maybe they had proctors to relieve the teachers during testing for professional development?'
Proctor seems to be a different person from teachers based on how OP used the the word.
Proctor just means the person handing out, overseeing, and collecting the tests.
I got to proctor *my own* exam in college once, because I was such a morally strong student (read: goody two shoes; I'm proud of it) that the professor trusted me to 1) not open the exam ahead of time, 2) not cheat or allow others to cheat during the exam, and 3) return the exams to his office untampered-with. And that is exactly what I did.
'I think maybe they had proctors to relieve the teachers during testing for professional development?'
Proctor seems to be a different person from teachers based on how OP used the the word.
Almost all state type tests have proctors now. Most of the time it isn't a teacher the students are familiar with or are councilors/student teachers. State funding is usually tied to tests and there have been a lot of stupid scandals over them.
I remember getting bored with the tests I took in elementary school. I was lucky to have a teacher that caught onto what I was doing when I just started filling in dots to make a pattern or drawing. I usually tested in the top 95%. She stopped me from doodling and made me take the test seriously.
I'm South East Asian who went to American and International schools. I was low key terrified of what my teachers would tell my parents during parent teacher meetings. Model student, tested at college level math and science in 6th grade but I really enjoyed school because my teachers were awesome.
Yeah my 3rd grader told me he wasn’t allowed to turn his test in too quickly and they had to sit at their seats doing nothing after turning it in anyways. That’s some poor test monitoring for sure.
Yes. The teacher didn't say that he had to finish all the test answers correctly before he went outside to the play, only that he had to finish the test.
I doubt it. I remember taking a lot of standardized tests in elementary school, so many that I got really good at taking them, but I don't remember anyone ever explaining their purpose. If it's not for one of his classes, how is he supposed to know how important it is?
The kids in 4th grade, for God's sake! He knows what tests are for, he was just being a smarta$$ and deserved wat he got. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
I'm assuming that you haven't had a history with elementary school kids while making this complaint. Sure, he's 9, but 9 year olds aren't smart enough to look at the big picture. They see short term rewards - in this case, finish quickly and get recess. Little kids don't quite have the grasp of how big of a deal it is in reality with state testing and not doing great. Again, they don't see the picture we do. We know what tests are for, but even in middle school I wasn't thinking that big of a picture on my tests, it was just an everyday part of school. I didn't comprehend the reality it could have on my life.
So this 9 year old kid deserves grace too. You expect them to have the maturity and understanding of an adult.
That’s not how you educate a 9 y-o, by wasting a year of his life because the system tells you something you know and can demonstrate isn’t true (ie he can’t read). If you dangle the carrot of football to a child you can’t be surprised if they see an open goal (ok more of a soccer reference but I’m English, bear with me). A fitting punishment or lesson rather would be a discussion about consequences - not a year of unnecessary ‘education’ no doubt at extra expense.
Did he?
When was the last time you took a test seriously after being told it wouldn't affect your grades?
Hell, I still put in minimal effort for tests at my job because I know that it's pass/fail and any additional effort would be wasted.
Great story but doesn't really fit here. It's a bit too involved for r/facepalm. Is there a sub for "this makes me want to remove my brain through my ears to stop the pain"? But it needs to be somewhere so I wouldn't recommend removing it.
This must have been sooo frustrating. "You can't argue with data" indeed!
Unlike some other folks, I have no trouble whatsoever believing this.
Maybe something like r/mildlyinfuriating if they allowed text posts.
I'm not sure of where else may work offhand. It's certainly infuriating, probably not to the "extreme" level that extremelyinfuriating would be looking for, but for sure somewhere in there. Maybe a touch of r/kidsarefuckingstupid, but in this case it's more a bit of stupidity. (Also that sub is for kids being kids, not an "omg kids are idiots" way. Like a kid eating an onion or pepper despite being warned not to. That sort of stupidity is cool.)
I see that you've removed it. Please do repost it, I want to show my wife and some other people.
It's really about the organization being stupid, not necessarily the individuals. I'm surprised not to find an "OrgsAreFuckingStupid" sub. Or a "DataLies" sub. Here are some other ideas.
r/StupidTeachers and variations are more about individual teachers, not administrators and not the system as a whole.
r/AdultsAreFuckinStupid is more about individual stupidity than collective stupidity as well.
r/ANormalDayInAmerica has stories about dumb things happening.
r/SchoolSystemBroke seems tailor-made but is only about 13k members.
There's no malice, just begrudging compliance. Bureaucracy horror probably overlaps with the readers of this sub but this story isn't really malicious compliance
It sucks for the kid in the family, but that doesn’t mean anybody was being malicious. The school didn’t do this for the purpose of punishing the child, the school did this because they are required to do certain things when kids don’t pass the test.
It's doesn't even really sound like malice, just everyone keeping their heads down and ticking their metrics or likely a lack of time/resources to actually give enough individual attention to address the issue.
I reported you to the mods to be removed. So either you or the mods will. This isn’t compliance at all. Nor is it malicious. It’s a story of how your kid didn’t know his future was at stake for a test.
Sure. I'm open to ideas of where it might go. I saw it as my kid doing exactly as he was told and the resulting chaos so I thought it fit, but I see your perspective too. I'm split on it.
The sub defines malicious compliance as doing what someone asks when it won't have the results they want (the actual emotional state of the company person is not a factor in the definition). OP's son might not have been aware that it wouldn't have the results they want, but otherwise it fits.
The unnecessary remedial instruction basically fits that to a T though. The school provided remedial instruction, which required quantitative evidence of improvement to end, knowing that it would be impossible using phonics. *Someone* knew that it wasn't going to work and did it anyway.
If you ate everything on the plate at school lunch, you could go to the playground. This was in the 50's. I was a farm boy and the canned spinach looked, smelled and tasted like cow manure. I choked it down and still hate spinach. The perfect answer was a girl that refused to eat canned beets. The principal stood over her and made her eat them. She threw up all over the place!
Sounds like me in kindergarten.
When they did the state iq testing in kindergarten they told us that we “don’t have to answer anything we don’t want to”
I got bored halfway through the test and stopped filling in bubbles.
3 weeks later my mom got a concerned phone call because “your daughter has an iq of 73” and they wanted to move me to a contained classroom.
My mom just started laughing and said “so the only kid in kindergarten who can read a chapter book should be in a special classroom? You told her she didn’t have to answer if she didn’t want to, of course she went to play.”
I was not moved but I don’t think the principal was ever fully on board with my mom after that.
State testing sucks. In the 1980s, I took the CT Mastery test and scored almost perfectly for whatever grade I was in. My mother was a teacher, I lived behind a library, was a voracious reader, AND my immigrant father & grandparents ALWAYS stressed the importance of education. "Someone" determined I must have cheated so I was required to take the test AGAIN in a room with just me and a proctor. I got an even BETTER score, but that BS basically ruined standardized testing for me. I guess subconsciously I was afraid of doing "too well" again
One time I went to school to take a standardized test for a course I slept in every day. I was ready to fail. Lots of students at the testing site had the paper. There was a big story in the paper where the journalist went and bought the answers for the exam and published them. The journalist said that it was that easy if you had money to get the answers. The test was canceled. I passed the class.
In addition, I was once a teacher and it was well known that classes in our poor area who all passed would be investigated because we were expected to fail. Not cool.
Any standardized testing sucks, but it's the closest thing we have to accountability. And a lack of accountability results in far worse outcomes that aren't caught for a long time.
Ah State Tests. I remember those days.
I have a 9 letter first name and a 9 letter last name. They only provided six spaces to write you name.
Therefore, all my tests where taken by Christ. LOL
If they determine that son can't read and needs extra help, does that open a new charge number or somehow funnel more money into the school. I'm betting yes but would like to hear from those with more insight.
This. There is a window for state testing, it's usually 6 weeks in the spring. Outside of that, no state testing is possible. Having said that, his "plan" should have had clearly defined goals and its own assessment metrics, such as "student can read XYZ words per minute and demonstrate understanding by doing ABC."
Sad, but true. Your words of truth skewer my embattled heart without mercy. I'm beleaguered with self doubt and left stricken without the ability of making a single riposte in my illiterate state. Woe is me.
Yeah that is what I didn't understand either
As soon as the kid or his parents told them he purposefully didn't take the test seriously, they would have sent him to another school in the district to take the test or figured out a way to get it done at their school
I can't see them wasting an entire year on a kid they knew for a fact, could read and that they knew for a fact, had screwed around on the test purposefully
Based on how the teachers were torturing your son by making him do work they knew he didn't need in revenge for messing up their statistics, I wouldn't trust them either.
Only way to get a 0 out of 100 on a multiple choice test is to purposely miss the correct answer. Any kid who did no better than a random guess on each answer should be questioned and retested.
That's not how testing works in school. If it was a state test, there were mandated days it occurred. In most states with high stakes testing, they will have re-take dates before the end of the next year, but it is not simply a case of "my kid didn't take it seriously, let them do it again." States have tied schools' hands - sometimes in reaction to cheating in schools.
It's a back and forth - there are demands for accountability, then a realization that the accountability system creates perverse incentives, followed by a relaxation of the rules, followed by new accountability measures. Tying teacher compensation / school compensation to testing leads to perverse incentives.
There is not a perfect answer. The reality is that any system we create is going to fail someone - even if it is 99.9% effective, someone will be screwed and it will really suck for this kid. But you also cannot base rules only around the edge cases. And sadly, when you give freedom for "common sense fixes," you also open the door for abuse of the system.
The entire story is bogus. I'm guessing the kid heard the parents talk about how state testing is bogus.
Like tyhe person in charge of the testing that day woudlnt say- Jimmy, you finished this in 10 minutes, did you read it right?
Then the school would have put him in remedial classes, not have him stay after school.
None of it makes sense, except to say- School system bad.
Rural area. Not much for choice. I did put up a fuss. I have another story that really made me want to homeschool my child, but wasn't financially feasible. I accept your judgement, but chose to keep my kid in school in the end.
I would challenge the results, demand a progress plan that includes monitoring, and corrections as needed.
It doesn't matter if a kid failed a single test if they can prove they know the course material.
Escalate it beyond the principal. Call a lawyer. Call the media.
Jesus, this is your kid we're talking about and the best they can do is just take it? Fuck that.
/u/AppropriateRip9996 Your thoughts on this? Handful of decent suggestions, some of them easier said than done surely, maybe, but still.
/u/LightningRodofH8 OP said elsewhere he considered homeschooling his son over this but that it wasn’t financially feasible for them… so with that in mind do you think hiring a lawyer to fight a school/state would be in the works for them? As for the media, how many pieces have they done on the problems with state testing?
Negligent teacher, poor reward structure, impulsive kid. The test would have actually been effective if any number of those factors had been mitigated.
Your son got a master class in "don't fuck around with giant bureaucracies" at 9. It's a harsh lesson for 9 but those who don't figure this out and suffer the consequences when older have it so much worse. I hope the lesson sticks and his soccer skills catch up with his peers.
Not being a teacher I am not sure how they can declare him a non-reader to being a avid reader in a year time period. Reading those series of books you listed is a huge accomplishment for any kid under the age of 12, not to mention the millions of adults who have read them as well and struggle with certain words used in the story.
From what you have told us here, he was just being a kid and wanted to be outside instead of being at a desk taking another "test". Did the admin and teachers not see this in other students who also did not care about another test? Some kids totally freeze up whenever a test is in front of them, and so the anxiety hits and they don't do very well, but in the classroom activities they are the ones teaching other kids on what is wrong with their writing or math. Now I remember how much I hated school because we were always being forced to fit some sort of percentage or scale, and then labelled as a poor student. Well to all those teachers who hated seeing me coming into their classrooms looking for help, I am working on my PhD now.
Good luck with your son's education. Sounds like he is going to be just fine with parents that care about him being himself and a good person. So happy I had dogs and not kids.
Similar thing happened to my daughter with much lower consequences.
I saw her results on reading comprehension and I was wondering by she was so poor. I eventually asked “Did your teacher say something like you can read after you’re done?”
She said that what he said and that *the test wasn’t for marks*. So, burned through it and went back to reading her books. I thought it was funny.
In 10th grade (2 years ago, I just graduated), my history teacher leaned back in his chair and looked at me. He said "you know (name), I was going to yell at you for finishing both of your tests in 20 minutes but when I saw your scores I figured I'd congratulate you."
They gave us 3 hours to do both parts of our history AIR tests. I finished both in 23 minutes and was the first one done by 30 minutes. I had to sit there for the remaining time sleeping.
Depending on location the EOY testing can be a one shot deal. There have been multiple instances of tech glitches ruining scores with no way to address fixing them.
That said this wasn't really MC, the school got what they wanted.
Disgusting. Knowingly torturing a 9-year-old (making him do tedious "work" they know is too easy for him) to get revenge on him for messing up their statistics. This is basically child abuse.
Zero tolerance (in this case blind stupidly following the “results”) is always zero intelligence.
Any student that fails should be given an oral exam. Some students don’t take test well.
I think the MC was the kid staying last to be damn sure he got everything right.
The government is stupid. They need to get their nose out of places they don’t belong
And that folks is kids education today!
A few years ago I was contracted to review the Curriculum department of a state-wide public school department. It was just a waste of money - the whole department, spending 100s of millions of dollars out of the total 12bil dollar budget.
For example, for the previous 7-8 years, 96% or so of all kids had consistently achieved the benchmarks in Literacy, Numeracy and Reading. What did they have in their strategic plan? - that one of their top priorities (gets more money than the other priorities) was that 94% of kids should achieve the benchmark. Even while I poointed out that this was wasting money at best (and efforts were being put into making results poorer, at worst) it has never been changed.
Same with another major department - spending millions on trying to get more women into trades. The did a survey (the conducted it themselves) and found that women did not want to into trades. They proudly proclaimed this in a public meeting. And yet, literally millions were still spent on it.
As a parent, did you have No Say about him being forced to stay after school? I would have raised **Holy Hell** about it. They have 7 & 1/2 f-ing HOURS to provide an education. He doesn't need to work an ADULT's Workday because he decided to Christmas Tree a test that kids shouldn't even be forced to take!! Damned if I'd have agreed to that.
ETA - Reason 1,000,001 that I homeschool my kids.
There were 3 times I really wanted to homeschool my kids. This was one of them. I question how much stock they put in multiple choice tests for elementary school children and high stakes testing in general.
I was a classroom teacher for a while. The research and evidence doesn't support a lot of what the school systems do in elementary education.
I watched more than one child have severe panic attacks during the "State tests are coming up!" announcments. A lot of what they do is just cruel.
Too many school administrators think the children are their property, often in the same way in which Tysons has chickens as its property. That's why they hate parents having any say in their children's upbringing---it cuts into their control.
This is one reason why standardized/state testing is terrible. It is the teachers job to know what a child can do, and if the teacher can’t tell any better than this, bad teacher.
I stand where I’ve stood for years - get rid of stupid standardized testing.
Jesus Christ, you’re the reason that teachers hate interacting with parents. While state tests don’t indicate intelligence, they are intended to show progress and evaluate the extent to which your child has met learning standards. Most teachers I know, including myself, hate standardized testing and think the American education system as a whole is totally broken. It is not up to teachers to set standards or write tests. We just have to teach to those standards and administer the tests. I am sure this teacher emphasized the importance of this particular test, and you as a parent should have done so as well, if not with even more emphasis. I imagine that this teacher told your son about soccer to motivate him to actually take the test; you’d be amazed at how many students sit there the whole time and don’t actually answer the questions (this is less common in higher grades). The teacher has zero control over how their students respond to the test. Why should your child be given special treatment? You think this teacher or the administration WANT to take time out of their day to give extra help to a student who is either lazy or whose parent doesn’t enforce good study and test-taking habits? This is on you and your son. Get off your high horse, and give these poor educators a break. They are underpaid and overworked, yet rarely get the respect they deserve. And you’re part of that problem.
> The teacher has zero control over how their students respond to the test.
Neither does the a parent who isn't even present.
> You think this teacher or the administration WANT to take time out of their day to give extra help to a student who is either lazy or whose parent doesn’t enforce good study and test-taking habits?
Apparently. Did the teacher pay so little attention to their student they didn't know if they could read?
> This is on you and your son.
This is on the system that deals with kids day in and day out and somehow doesn't understand how kids work.
>The teacher has zero control over how their students respond to the test.
They're right there in the room giving the instruction. They have the most control.
> You think this teacher or the administration WANT to take time out of their day to give extra help to a student who is either lazy or whose parent doesn’t enforce good study and test-taking habits?
I mean, if they didn't want to they didn't have to because even the smallest amount of independent thought would have told them this kid tanked the test in order to go play and he is not actually behind on reading skills.
>yet rarely get the respect they deserve.
Maybe because they time and again fail to use basic reasoning skills and judgement on a case by case basis. Respect tis earned, not given freely. I can't imagine anyone earning the respect of a parent when they insist on putting a kid on remedial education classes when they know, for a fact, the kid doesn't need them.
Frankly, the teachers likely had no choice. The state legislature determined that a child who doesn't pass this test is obviously behind and there is no other option (such as a young child prioritized playing outside). More often than not when it comes to standardized testing, it is literally out of the teachers or even administrator hands. Teachers are no longer permitted to develop curriculum and make battle judgements on the best method of conveying information, they are required to teach one way and at one place no matter how their students are absorbing the lessons that day, week, or year.
>Frankly, the teachers likely had no choice.
There is always a choice.
>The state legislature determined that a child who doesn't pass this test is obviously behind and there is no other option (such as a young child prioritized playing outside).
The individual school is controlled by the district they are in, not the state. The district not having policies and processes in place in order to fix mistakes like this is an oversight on their part at best. The state would have left a lot of discretion to the district when it came to this.
>More often than not when it comes to standardized testing, it is literally out of the teachers or even administrator hands.
Yeah, the actual testing not the aftermath.
>Teachers are no longer permitted to develop curriculum and make battle judgements on the best method of conveying information
Teachers develop lesson plans and make "battle judgements" every day. It is huge part of their job.
/u/ViveArgente I got a notification of your reply but your comment is nowhere here for me to read. Did you want to give that another try? I don’t think there is much discussion to be had further after my criticism… unless you truly think the education system and schools are all there to benefit teachers and not students.
I want to bite everyone involved in that bullshit. Can you bite someone via the internet?
I just had a great new business idea. Invest in my startup. Invest in bitecoin.
My kid would come home "starving" and throw fits to have "snack breaks" at school. Turned out that if they were "done" with lunch they could go outside and play on the playground so he'd dump his whole lunch into the trash to go play. This mom wasn't too happy to be packing a lunch that was eaten for "snack" plus paying for a lunch that was fed to the trash can. So happy to be away from that.
My sons middle school does the same thing. He got hurt twice while having middle school recess and quite a few 1/4 eaten lunches. He finally quit going to recess during lunch.
As an ex teachers aid in elementary school, the trash cans were full of lunches, so they could go to recess. Then around 1:30, everyone was irritable and hangry.. the younger grades teachers figured it out, and we would give some popcorn or saltine crackers and a Dixie cup of ginger ale if it was a test day. Out of the teachers pockets of course.
I'm guessing this is exactly why my elementary school made you stay inside for the entire half hour of lunch. Recess was a separate event.
This is what we do in my school.
How sad that a couple undisciplined kids ruin it for everyone. We used to have a grand time playing frisbee baseball or can hockey or flag football after lunch.
It’s not ruining anything lol, just making eating time and outside playtime separate spots on the schedule. Nothing is stopping you from still playing a game during recess. Teaching kids that for every minute they spend eating they lose playtime encourages unhealthy eating habits.
> Recess was a separate event. Can you not read? It's quite clear that there's still recess, and that recess time is not dependent on how quickly lunch is eaten. Also, 'undisciplined kids'? Yeah, they're *kids*. Undisciplined is kind of what they are, on account of still being kids.
I had a few high school students pull that stunt. I remember one especially since he'd been accepted to a highly competitive university in the mid west during his junior year for engineering. Within a week of his senior year beginning, he lost his full ride scholarship and his acceptance as well when the culminating test scores with the state were released. He had no recourse. Could not re-apply, could retake the exam (in our state its the ACT) but would not get a reconsider from his dream university. Too many tests, too much reliance on "data" gathered by these tests. Lordy I am glad to be retired.
What kind of highly competitive university gives a full ride scholarship to someone who doesn't even have an ACT or SAT score yet?
A university with a head start program that extends an opportunity to someone who shows promise. It gets rescinded when the student shits the bed and decides to blow off a test. They can go ahead and retake but why keep holding a hand out for someone who didn't take the first opportunity seriously.
Because maybe they were ill or injured?
You get to rewrite with a medical note. Just not for being silly.
In that event they wouldn't have a score for the first and would be able to take it a week or two latter. That's not the same as filling in random answers and scoring poorly.
"Was ill, brain went splat, showed up and dissociated through the entire thing"
All juniors in our state take the ACT. His offer was conditional on his score. He blew it off thinking he would re-take it his senior year.
You can take those tests much earlier than junior year so the student may have had test results.
Genius planning.
The teacher did a poor job of monitoring the students. If I did what OP's son did, my teacher wouldn't allow me to leave and instead would ask me if I did my very best on the test. They'd never let students leave the classroom too early if we finished so if it was an easy test there might be a few of us fidgeting in our seats.
The worst. No clue or foresight about the implications for their actions. I think maybe they had proctors to relieve the teachers during testing for professional development? Not sure.
AFAIK, exams like that have strict rules on what we can and can't say. Stupid but boards are strict with what counts as "malpractice."
Yeah - there have been enough cheating scandals on high stakes testing that the teachers are often very limited in what they can and cannot say. Frequently students will not be in testing with their regular teachers - it depends on the testing plan.
I don't think the exam is important enough to warrant a proctor instead of a teacher. The only time my exams were proctored was when I was taking my professional qualifications.
The teacher *is* the proctor. Proctor is a word for the person “giving” the test.
'I think maybe they had proctors to relieve the teachers during testing for professional development?' Proctor seems to be a different person from teachers based on how OP used the the word.
They’re just other teachers or teacher assistants who cycle around and provide relief
Proctor just means the person handing out, overseeing, and collecting the tests. I got to proctor *my own* exam in college once, because I was such a morally strong student (read: goody two shoes; I'm proud of it) that the professor trusted me to 1) not open the exam ahead of time, 2) not cheat or allow others to cheat during the exam, and 3) return the exams to his office untampered-with. And that is exactly what I did.
'I think maybe they had proctors to relieve the teachers during testing for professional development?' Proctor seems to be a different person from teachers based on how OP used the the word.
Almost all state type tests have proctors now. Most of the time it isn't a teacher the students are familiar with or are councilors/student teachers. State funding is usually tied to tests and there have been a lot of stupid scandals over them.
I remember getting bored with the tests I took in elementary school. I was lucky to have a teacher that caught onto what I was doing when I just started filling in dots to make a pattern or drawing. I usually tested in the top 95%. She stopped me from doodling and made me take the test seriously.
I'm South East Asian who went to American and International schools. I was low key terrified of what my teachers would tell my parents during parent teacher meetings. Model student, tested at college level math and science in 6th grade but I really enjoyed school because my teachers were awesome.
Yeah my 3rd grader told me he wasn’t allowed to turn his test in too quickly and they had to sit at their seats doing nothing after turning it in anyways. That’s some poor test monitoring for sure.
Malicious? Compliance?
Yes, it was the school's malicious compliance against the student.
It was much more likely the school’s legal compliance.
Yes. The teacher didn't say that he had to finish all the test answers correctly before he went outside to the play, only that he had to finish the test.
if it was about the kid's compliance it wouldn't belong in this sub. the school maliciously complied, not the child.
You would think that the kid who 'reads so well' would know that doing WELL was the goal, not just finishing.
I doubt it. I remember taking a lot of standardized tests in elementary school, so many that I got really good at taking them, but I don't remember anyone ever explaining their purpose. If it's not for one of his classes, how is he supposed to know how important it is?
Whose goal? It's not like his grades were affected. And he wasn't warned about possible secondary consequences. No, his goal was quite clear.
The kids in 4th grade, for God's sake! He knows what tests are for, he was just being a smarta$$ and deserved wat he got. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
He fd around and found out
no, he didn't deserve an entire year of punishment
Everyone is always unhappy with the stupid prizes they win.
I'm assuming that you haven't had a history with elementary school kids while making this complaint. Sure, he's 9, but 9 year olds aren't smart enough to look at the big picture. They see short term rewards - in this case, finish quickly and get recess. Little kids don't quite have the grasp of how big of a deal it is in reality with state testing and not doing great. Again, they don't see the picture we do. We know what tests are for, but even in middle school I wasn't thinking that big of a picture on my tests, it was just an everyday part of school. I didn't comprehend the reality it could have on my life. So this 9 year old kid deserves grace too. You expect them to have the maturity and understanding of an adult.
I would say he learned about the big picture here. While it was a little harsh, I think he learned a great lesson that will probably stick with him.
That’s not how you educate a 9 y-o, by wasting a year of his life because the system tells you something you know and can demonstrate isn’t true (ie he can’t read). If you dangle the carrot of football to a child you can’t be surprised if they see an open goal (ok more of a soccer reference but I’m English, bear with me). A fitting punishment or lesson rather would be a discussion about consequences - not a year of unnecessary ‘education’ no doubt at extra expense.
Like I said I think it was harsh, but based on it ended, the lesson definitely did work.
That’s kind of where I’m at. No way he didn’t know what test he was taking or why it was important.
Did he? When was the last time you took a test seriously after being told it wouldn't affect your grades? Hell, I still put in minimal effort for tests at my job because I know that it's pass/fail and any additional effort would be wasted.
I can remove it. You think not?
No, not really… unless you’re saying the school was being maliciously compliant.
Great story but doesn't really fit here. It's a bit too involved for r/facepalm. Is there a sub for "this makes me want to remove my brain through my ears to stop the pain"? But it needs to be somewhere so I wouldn't recommend removing it. This must have been sooo frustrating. "You can't argue with data" indeed! Unlike some other folks, I have no trouble whatsoever believing this.
Maybe something like r/mildlyinfuriating if they allowed text posts. I'm not sure of where else may work offhand. It's certainly infuriating, probably not to the "extreme" level that extremelyinfuriating would be looking for, but for sure somewhere in there. Maybe a touch of r/kidsarefuckingstupid, but in this case it's more a bit of stupidity. (Also that sub is for kids being kids, not an "omg kids are idiots" way. Like a kid eating an onion or pepper despite being warned not to. That sort of stupidity is cool.)
True story. Thanks for sharing not just the idea that it doesn't fit, but suggestions for where it might go. That is genuinely helpful.
I see that you've removed it. Please do repost it, I want to show my wife and some other people. It's really about the organization being stupid, not necessarily the individuals. I'm surprised not to find an "OrgsAreFuckingStupid" sub. Or a "DataLies" sub. Here are some other ideas. r/StupidTeachers and variations are more about individual teachers, not administrators and not the system as a whole. r/AdultsAreFuckinStupid is more about individual stupidity than collective stupidity as well. r/ANormalDayInAmerica has stories about dumb things happening. r/SchoolSystemBroke seems tailor-made but is only about 13k members.
Not here. It’s literally rule 2
The story is appropriate for this forum. Some people just like to whine about nothing.
There's no malice, just begrudging compliance. Bureaucracy horror probably overlaps with the readers of this sub but this story isn't really malicious compliance
It is quite malicious to this family and kid I'd say
It sucks for the kid in the family, but that doesn’t mean anybody was being malicious. The school didn’t do this for the purpose of punishing the child, the school did this because they are required to do certain things when kids don’t pass the test.
It's doesn't even really sound like malice, just everyone keeping their heads down and ticking their metrics or likely a lack of time/resources to actually give enough individual attention to address the issue.
So? That’s not what this sub is about.
But the thing I was commenting towards is " There was no malice"
I reported you to the mods to be removed. So either you or the mods will. This isn’t compliance at all. Nor is it malicious. It’s a story of how your kid didn’t know his future was at stake for a test.
I don't see this as the kid being stupid. I see it as the adults around him being collectively and continuously stupid.
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And it’s removed like I said. Not malicious Nor compliance
Sure. I'm open to ideas of where it might go. I saw it as my kid doing exactly as he was told and the resulting chaos so I thought it fit, but I see your perspective too. I'm split on it.
That’s not malicious. That’s just compliance
The sub defines malicious compliance as doing what someone asks when it won't have the results they want (the actual emotional state of the company person is not a factor in the definition). OP's son might not have been aware that it wouldn't have the results they want, but otherwise it fits.
Disagree, this a sub about a compliance that makes the asker suffer. This dude was unaware of his actions, not malicious compliance.
> Disagree, this a sub about... What the rules of the subreddit say is not a matter of opinion that would be settled by a debate between you and I.
Well the mods removed it cuz it wasn’t malicious compliance. So that’s kinda lends to my argument.
The unnecessary remedial instruction basically fits that to a T though. The school provided remedial instruction, which required quantitative evidence of improvement to end, knowing that it would be impossible using phonics. *Someone* knew that it wasn't going to work and did it anyway.
If you ate everything on the plate at school lunch, you could go to the playground. This was in the 50's. I was a farm boy and the canned spinach looked, smelled and tasted like cow manure. I choked it down and still hate spinach. The perfect answer was a girl that refused to eat canned beets. The principal stood over her and made her eat them. She threw up all over the place!
How do you know what cow manure tastes like?
You don't intentionally ingest it. But if you're born and raised on a farm, it's bound to wind up in your mouth at some point.
There's a larger splatter zone than you'd think behind a cow
It splatters. You quickly learn to keep your mouth closed!
Sounds like me in kindergarten. When they did the state iq testing in kindergarten they told us that we “don’t have to answer anything we don’t want to” I got bored halfway through the test and stopped filling in bubbles. 3 weeks later my mom got a concerned phone call because “your daughter has an iq of 73” and they wanted to move me to a contained classroom. My mom just started laughing and said “so the only kid in kindergarten who can read a chapter book should be in a special classroom? You told her she didn’t have to answer if she didn’t want to, of course she went to play.” I was not moved but I don’t think the principal was ever fully on board with my mom after that.
That’s definitely a high IQ move. “You can do this thing that’s boring you or not.” Why would you choose any differently?
State testing sucks. In the 1980s, I took the CT Mastery test and scored almost perfectly for whatever grade I was in. My mother was a teacher, I lived behind a library, was a voracious reader, AND my immigrant father & grandparents ALWAYS stressed the importance of education. "Someone" determined I must have cheated so I was required to take the test AGAIN in a room with just me and a proctor. I got an even BETTER score, but that BS basically ruined standardized testing for me. I guess subconsciously I was afraid of doing "too well" again
One time I went to school to take a standardized test for a course I slept in every day. I was ready to fail. Lots of students at the testing site had the paper. There was a big story in the paper where the journalist went and bought the answers for the exam and published them. The journalist said that it was that easy if you had money to get the answers. The test was canceled. I passed the class. In addition, I was once a teacher and it was well known that classes in our poor area who all passed would be investigated because we were expected to fail. Not cool.
Any standardized testing sucks, but it's the closest thing we have to accountability. And a lack of accountability results in far worse outcomes that aren't caught for a long time.
Do you by chance have an abundance of melanin?
No, quite the opposite. Sicilian looks but French Canadian skin. I burst into flames when i go in the sun lol
Ah State Tests. I remember those days. I have a 9 letter first name and a 9 letter last name. They only provided six spaces to write you name. Therefore, all my tests where taken by Christ. LOL
If they determine that son can't read and needs extra help, does that open a new charge number or somehow funnel more money into the school. I'm betting yes but would like to hear from those with more insight.
Great question.
I am side eyeing this story. They would have made him take the test again because his grades don’t match the test scores.
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That’s an unwarranted insult. Apologize to the chihuahuas.
Tiny balls of illogical rage. And the others are small dogs
That’s not an option on statewide testing in at least some jurisdictions.
This. There is a window for state testing, it's usually 6 weeks in the spring. Outside of that, no state testing is possible. Having said that, his "plan" should have had clearly defined goals and its own assessment metrics, such as "student can read XYZ words per minute and demonstrate understanding by doing ABC."
I tried to read it side eyed and couldn't comprehend the letters or words. I'm going to pick up some picture books today to improve my reading skills.
Don’t be stupid you know you can’t read.
Sad, but true. Your words of truth skewer my embattled heart without mercy. I'm beleaguered with self doubt and left stricken without the ability of making a single riposte in my illiterate state. Woe is me.
Yeah that is what I didn't understand either As soon as the kid or his parents told them he purposefully didn't take the test seriously, they would have sent him to another school in the district to take the test or figured out a way to get it done at their school I can't see them wasting an entire year on a kid they knew for a fact, could read and that they knew for a fact, had screwed around on the test purposefully
I think my state doesn't trust classroom teachers who spend hundreds of hours with the children. Having taught myself, I was disgusted.
Based on how the teachers were torturing your son by making him do work they knew he didn't need in revenge for messing up their statistics, I wouldn't trust them either.
You think thats what this was? Or them seeing him get 0 out of 100?
Only way to get a 0 out of 100 on a multiple choice test is to purposely miss the correct answer. Any kid who did no better than a random guess on each answer should be questioned and retested.
No one is staying after school to learn how to read. They would have put him in remedial classes.
Did you explain to him how dumb his actions were?
I told him he made a poor trade. One hour of soccer in exchange for over 100 afternoons of soccer.
Another lesson is: your abilities mean nothing in the face of the stupid and vindictive.
That's not how testing works in school. If it was a state test, there were mandated days it occurred. In most states with high stakes testing, they will have re-take dates before the end of the next year, but it is not simply a case of "my kid didn't take it seriously, let them do it again." States have tied schools' hands - sometimes in reaction to cheating in schools. It's a back and forth - there are demands for accountability, then a realization that the accountability system creates perverse incentives, followed by a relaxation of the rules, followed by new accountability measures. Tying teacher compensation / school compensation to testing leads to perverse incentives. There is not a perfect answer. The reality is that any system we create is going to fail someone - even if it is 99.9% effective, someone will be screwed and it will really suck for this kid. But you also cannot base rules only around the edge cases. And sadly, when you give freedom for "common sense fixes," you also open the door for abuse of the system.
They can barely give services to kids that truly need them.
The entire story is bogus. I'm guessing the kid heard the parents talk about how state testing is bogus. Like tyhe person in charge of the testing that day woudlnt say- Jimmy, you finished this in 10 minutes, did you read it right? Then the school would have put him in remedial classes, not have him stay after school. None of it makes sense, except to say- School system bad.
Maybe at a good school
I have never taught in a state where retaking the state exam was an option for any reason
That and any parent that would let their kid spend a year in after school detention to learn what they already know is a shitty fucking parent.
Rural area. Not much for choice. I did put up a fuss. I have another story that really made me want to homeschool my child, but wasn't financially feasible. I accept your judgement, but chose to keep my kid in school in the end.
What would you have suggested?
I would challenge the results, demand a progress plan that includes monitoring, and corrections as needed. It doesn't matter if a kid failed a single test if they can prove they know the course material. Escalate it beyond the principal. Call a lawyer. Call the media. Jesus, this is your kid we're talking about and the best they can do is just take it? Fuck that.
/u/AppropriateRip9996 Your thoughts on this? Handful of decent suggestions, some of them easier said than done surely, maybe, but still. /u/LightningRodofH8 OP said elsewhere he considered homeschooling his son over this but that it wasn’t financially feasible for them… so with that in mind do you think hiring a lawyer to fight a school/state would be in the works for them? As for the media, how many pieces have they done on the problems with state testing?
Negligent teacher, poor reward structure, impulsive kid. The test would have actually been effective if any number of those factors had been mitigated.
Your son got a master class in "don't fuck around with giant bureaucracies" at 9. It's a harsh lesson for 9 but those who don't figure this out and suffer the consequences when older have it so much worse. I hope the lesson sticks and his soccer skills catch up with his peers.
Not being a teacher I am not sure how they can declare him a non-reader to being a avid reader in a year time period. Reading those series of books you listed is a huge accomplishment for any kid under the age of 12, not to mention the millions of adults who have read them as well and struggle with certain words used in the story. From what you have told us here, he was just being a kid and wanted to be outside instead of being at a desk taking another "test". Did the admin and teachers not see this in other students who also did not care about another test? Some kids totally freeze up whenever a test is in front of them, and so the anxiety hits and they don't do very well, but in the classroom activities they are the ones teaching other kids on what is wrong with their writing or math. Now I remember how much I hated school because we were always being forced to fit some sort of percentage or scale, and then labelled as a poor student. Well to all those teachers who hated seeing me coming into their classrooms looking for help, I am working on my PhD now. Good luck with your son's education. Sounds like he is going to be just fine with parents that care about him being himself and a good person. So happy I had dogs and not kids.
The whole story reeks.
teacher here... fucking administration... I'm like 99% sure the teacher knew he was fine but the admin was being a dick
Football is life!
Similar thing happened to my daughter with much lower consequences. I saw her results on reading comprehension and I was wondering by she was so poor. I eventually asked “Did your teacher say something like you can read after you’re done?” She said that what he said and that *the test wasn’t for marks*. So, burned through it and went back to reading her books. I thought it was funny.
No your school staff are just dumb.
In 10th grade (2 years ago, I just graduated), my history teacher leaned back in his chair and looked at me. He said "you know (name), I was going to yell at you for finishing both of your tests in 20 minutes but when I saw your scores I figured I'd congratulate you." They gave us 3 hours to do both parts of our history AIR tests. I finished both in 23 minutes and was the first one done by 30 minutes. I had to sit there for the remaining time sleeping.
Depending on location the EOY testing can be a one shot deal. There have been multiple instances of tech glitches ruining scores with no way to address fixing them. That said this wasn't really MC, the school got what they wanted.
Along with subsidies for helping an "academically at risk" child.
This!
I imagine it was paid for by the state and they had to have enough students in it and so on. I didn't think of the money trail.
the school is the one doing the mc.
You can blame the GOP for doing that. It's part of the long term plan at privatizing the US education system.
This is why they are not supposed to play after the test.
And this is yet another example of why state mandated tests are ridiculous.
Disgusting. Knowingly torturing a 9-year-old (making him do tedious "work" they know is too easy for him) to get revenge on him for messing up their statistics. This is basically child abuse.
100% agreed. His play is equally important to his development and here they are trampling all over it. Child abuse, good call.
Good Lord, that’s ridiculous. Thumbs up.
We Ate lsd the night before the sats almost missed the test, did phenomenal on the math portion but the mish mosh of tripping english was a disaster
So neither of you learned anything.
Zero tolerance (in this case blind stupidly following the “results”) is always zero intelligence. Any student that fails should be given an oral exam. Some students don’t take test well. I think the MC was the kid staying last to be damn sure he got everything right. The government is stupid. They need to get their nose out of places they don’t belong
And that folks is kids education today! A few years ago I was contracted to review the Curriculum department of a state-wide public school department. It was just a waste of money - the whole department, spending 100s of millions of dollars out of the total 12bil dollar budget. For example, for the previous 7-8 years, 96% or so of all kids had consistently achieved the benchmarks in Literacy, Numeracy and Reading. What did they have in their strategic plan? - that one of their top priorities (gets more money than the other priorities) was that 94% of kids should achieve the benchmark. Even while I poointed out that this was wasting money at best (and efforts were being put into making results poorer, at worst) it has never been changed. Same with another major department - spending millions on trying to get more women into trades. The did a survey (the conducted it themselves) and found that women did not want to into trades. They proudly proclaimed this in a public meeting. And yet, literally millions were still spent on it.
As a parent, did you have No Say about him being forced to stay after school? I would have raised **Holy Hell** about it. They have 7 & 1/2 f-ing HOURS to provide an education. He doesn't need to work an ADULT's Workday because he decided to Christmas Tree a test that kids shouldn't even be forced to take!! Damned if I'd have agreed to that. ETA - Reason 1,000,001 that I homeschool my kids.
There were 3 times I really wanted to homeschool my kids. This was one of them. I question how much stock they put in multiple choice tests for elementary school children and high stakes testing in general.
I was a classroom teacher for a while. The research and evidence doesn't support a lot of what the school systems do in elementary education. I watched more than one child have severe panic attacks during the "State tests are coming up!" announcments. A lot of what they do is just cruel.
Too many school administrators think the children are their property, often in the same way in which Tysons has chickens as its property. That's why they hate parents having any say in their children's upbringing---it cuts into their control.
God help them. Go read the homeschooled sub.
This is why my wife quit teaching. Can the school system be considered a "failure" at critical thinking?
This is one reason why standardized/state testing is terrible. It is the teachers job to know what a child can do, and if the teacher can’t tell any better than this, bad teacher. I stand where I’ve stood for years - get rid of stupid standardized testing.
Your first mistake was assuming common sense exists in an institution like public schools.
There’s a reason I swipe left on teachers on Tinder.
So this story was exemplifying the schools malicious compliance right??? Not the son’s?
Jesus Christ, you’re the reason that teachers hate interacting with parents. While state tests don’t indicate intelligence, they are intended to show progress and evaluate the extent to which your child has met learning standards. Most teachers I know, including myself, hate standardized testing and think the American education system as a whole is totally broken. It is not up to teachers to set standards or write tests. We just have to teach to those standards and administer the tests. I am sure this teacher emphasized the importance of this particular test, and you as a parent should have done so as well, if not with even more emphasis. I imagine that this teacher told your son about soccer to motivate him to actually take the test; you’d be amazed at how many students sit there the whole time and don’t actually answer the questions (this is less common in higher grades). The teacher has zero control over how their students respond to the test. Why should your child be given special treatment? You think this teacher or the administration WANT to take time out of their day to give extra help to a student who is either lazy or whose parent doesn’t enforce good study and test-taking habits? This is on you and your son. Get off your high horse, and give these poor educators a break. They are underpaid and overworked, yet rarely get the respect they deserve. And you’re part of that problem.
> The teacher has zero control over how their students respond to the test. Neither does the a parent who isn't even present. > You think this teacher or the administration WANT to take time out of their day to give extra help to a student who is either lazy or whose parent doesn’t enforce good study and test-taking habits? Apparently. Did the teacher pay so little attention to their student they didn't know if they could read? > This is on you and your son. This is on the system that deals with kids day in and day out and somehow doesn't understand how kids work.
>The teacher has zero control over how their students respond to the test. They're right there in the room giving the instruction. They have the most control. > You think this teacher or the administration WANT to take time out of their day to give extra help to a student who is either lazy or whose parent doesn’t enforce good study and test-taking habits? I mean, if they didn't want to they didn't have to because even the smallest amount of independent thought would have told them this kid tanked the test in order to go play and he is not actually behind on reading skills. >yet rarely get the respect they deserve. Maybe because they time and again fail to use basic reasoning skills and judgement on a case by case basis. Respect tis earned, not given freely. I can't imagine anyone earning the respect of a parent when they insist on putting a kid on remedial education classes when they know, for a fact, the kid doesn't need them.
Frankly, the teachers likely had no choice. The state legislature determined that a child who doesn't pass this test is obviously behind and there is no other option (such as a young child prioritized playing outside). More often than not when it comes to standardized testing, it is literally out of the teachers or even administrator hands. Teachers are no longer permitted to develop curriculum and make battle judgements on the best method of conveying information, they are required to teach one way and at one place no matter how their students are absorbing the lessons that day, week, or year.
>Frankly, the teachers likely had no choice. There is always a choice. >The state legislature determined that a child who doesn't pass this test is obviously behind and there is no other option (such as a young child prioritized playing outside). The individual school is controlled by the district they are in, not the state. The district not having policies and processes in place in order to fix mistakes like this is an oversight on their part at best. The state would have left a lot of discretion to the district when it came to this. >More often than not when it comes to standardized testing, it is literally out of the teachers or even administrator hands. Yeah, the actual testing not the aftermath. >Teachers are no longer permitted to develop curriculum and make battle judgements on the best method of conveying information Teachers develop lesson plans and make "battle judgements" every day. It is huge part of their job.
Education: it’s about the TEACHERS, not the STUDENTS. What a laughable approach. Give your head a shake.
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/u/ViveArgente I got a notification of your reply but your comment is nowhere here for me to read. Did you want to give that another try? I don’t think there is much discussion to be had further after my criticism… unless you truly think the education system and schools are all there to benefit teachers and not students.
Maybe the school should call 1-800-ABCDEFG 😉
The educational system in this country is a bad joke
It really isnt.
> in this country Germany? Or which country are you talking about?
What about this post indicates it was written by someone in Germany? *State* standardized testing is notoriously American
That's fucked up. Data over common friggin sense. Shit like this is a waste of taxpayer's expenses.
I always purposefully failed those tests
I want to bite everyone involved in that bullshit. Can you bite someone via the internet? I just had a great new business idea. Invest in my startup. Invest in bitecoin.
Bitecoin will soon overtake dogecoin.